ON THE BEACH

TUESDAY 19th JULY

  When the sun is blazing down in a clear blue sky, the temptation is to look no further than to the beach.  It was a temptation I yielded to all too easily today!  After doing some work for Charly in the morning I set off for the beach, having liberally applied sun block all over the exposed parts of my body.  I found a nicely sloping part of the beach that neatly accomodated my body, and lay back for a bit of tanning.  However after a while I got bored, so I decided to go for a paddle in the sea now that my big toe was no longer an impediment.  As I meandered amongst the breaking waves, I was overtaken by the spirit of Vasco de Gama and decided to head forth in search of new lands, well new beaches to be more precise.  I got to the end of the local beach which was marked by a long walkway extending out into the sea, and I walked up to almost the end of it.

 Looking back towards land, I realised just how developed the seafront is, and yet despite the myriad of high rise hotels and apartments, The beaches were relatively deserted.  There was aboat anchored outside the port that showed no signs of moving.

  And so imbued with this spirit of adventure I pressed on in an easterly direction along the seafront.  Eventually I came across a whole array of bars and cafes on the edge of the beach with seating extending onto the beach.  About halfway along I decided  to stop and have a beer.  Stopping in the middle may have been an error, for this was the area most frequented by street vendors.  I had an offer of assorted female jewelry until I made it clear to the man that I had no woman to give it to, and he retreated in defeat.  Sunglasses were of no use to me as I already had a pair.  I was then accosted by a very persistent female who wanted to give me a pedicure and trim my eyebrows.  I politely declined her offer, as I am well able to cut my finger nails and I have an electric trimmer that does the eyebrows just fine.  "Manana?", she enquired hopefully.  "Yes, maybe manana", I replied making a mental note to avoid the area manana.  And then guess what, a CD vendor.  Now this was something I couldn't resist.  I now have samba, Brazilian pop and something by Paula Fernandes that the man assured me was very good.  I parted woith 10 reals (or £4) for these three and on mature reflection I came to the conclusion that I should have asked for 4 CD's for that price, but not being a haggler these reflections are slow in coming to me, in this case far too slow as the man was gone.

  As I may have mentioned the beer here is served with the bottle placed in a plastic cooler complete with cover.  What I may not have mentioned is the ludicrously small glasses that are provided to drink the beer from.  At first I thought it was a foible of the restaurant I was in, but it is uniformly the same wherever you order a beer here in Brazil.  Now to my mind a larger body of liquid would take longer to cool down, although that would I guess depend on the exposed surface area.  I tried to cast my mind back to my O/L Physics but it all proved to be too much of an effort, and I can only conclude that the reason for the small glasses is that you drink the content quickly so it doesn't have time to warm up, and then refill it with the cool stuff out of the chilled bottle.  Incidentally the glass I was given here is one of the bigger ones I've received.

   I have come across but three dogs here in Fortaleza, and all of them on a leash, in sharp contrast to the rest of South America where dogs seem to abound on the streets.  I also came across my first cat. It seemed friendly enough so I stroked it before parting company.  I saw a travel agent on my way home offering City Tours for 30 reals (£12) so I may investigate that tomorrow and see what else they have on offer.  I've bought a large bottle of Coke to see how my Cane Spirit fares with a mixer - a Brazilian version of Jim Bem & Coke?  I'll let you know Robert if it is any good!